“What do I do? What do I do? What do I do?” Christoph paced back and forth. His tail swung out wide as he turned and occasionally knocked something from a table. Hunching forward due to his tail, he resembled a dinosaur skulking for prey. He’d given up on trying to straighten himself as a humanoid when more pressing matters surfaced.

“They think I’m a powerful wizard!” His growling voice was occasionally accompanied by the slaps of his tail or the hiss of his reptilian throat. The tone and deepness still confused Christoph. Quite disorienting to hear one’s expected voice to be spoken with the tongue of another. “I don’t have a clue how to handle this! Magic! Leading! I can’t do this!” He looked toward the closed doors that blocked off the things and beasts Christoph had only ever dreamt about. “I need to get out of here.”

The book with the spells of a, now dead, wizard still rested silently on the table. Its cover was flat against the slab of stone. Christoph leaned back over the magical journal and began flipping through the pages.

“There has to be something!”

He landed on an early page in the book; the pages kept in a categorized system based on the strength and challenge of the spell. This wasn’t the first spell, but it was far from the end of the book.

“Acid Arrow.” Christoph read the name aloud, but without a focus or the right finesse it meant nothing. There was a gesture that needed to precede it. There were notes about the spells requirements beside the runic symbols suggesting the imagination of such a circle manifesting around one’s hand. Pointing at the target you wish to strike, you would need to funnel the correct amount of mana into the spell.

“Alright.” Christoph looked forward at the four pillars around the dais. “I probably shouldn’t hit those.” The carvings on the pillars were beautiful in their own grotesque ways. That sick fascination humanity has with troubling materials made him change his target to a small wooden rack set on the side of the room. It currently had no weapons or enchanted items on it.

Christoph stomped around the table to get a cleaner shot.

“Acid Arrow!” His outstretched claw was surrounded by a glowing circle of green energy. The symbols manifested within the rim of this hollow circle and began to spin around clockwise. Christoph had only used “Identify” which hadn’t costed much mana, but he did get that initial feel for the draining process. It was an irregular sensation like having a bit of your spirit pulled forward—your mind registering it as moving forward yet your body remains still. Like a droplet of mercury somehow blooping away from the whole leaving a smaller amoeba behind.

The green energy glowed brighter and brighter until a spark of the energy manifested as the tip of the acidic projectile. Christoph took this to mean it needed more; which the spell had already been overfed. Pushing more of himself into the spell, his ignorance caused the very thing that most practicing magic fear.

Backlashing, the acid shot out in several directions like green lightning. The spinning circle of energy congealed and burst around his claw. Christoph drew his arm back, but the acid had already begun sizzling the meat between the scales. Even a few of the hardened scales began to steam and gradually melt.

“Ah!” His reaction was more out of subconscious response than actual pain. His undead body felt the burn and could smell the flesh being chemically eroded, but the nerves weren’t firing in the same way his living, human body had. The ground around him had streams of steaming acid across different rocks in random spots. His hand was dripping with the acid. He could see flakes of his right claw being dissolved away and the softer flesh revealed below.

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His tougher exterior and the magical robes he wore assisted him more than he’d realized. Not only is he less likely to take damage or at least feel it while being an undead, his scales and the magical properties of his worn gear prevented the acid from spreading further. Most magical items couldn’t be destroyed so simply. Any acid which did burn the fabrics would soon be forgotten as the magical threads rewove themselves like a thriving vineyard.

While his hand steamed and bits fell off, Christoph watched with wide eyes. This is horrible! How can I get out of here if I can’t fight? They’ll know something’s up if I can’t even do magic! Christoph thought back to how the acid had burned over his back when he was still in his old body. This is crazy! How does this sort of thing happen? The steam slowly sputtered out and the corrosive properties of the viscous liquid were depleted.

Christoph leaned against the table with enough thoughts in his head to drive him crazy. How did this happen? Why am I here? I need to get out, but how? What can I do? Where’s my brother? Did I die? For all the questions in his head, he had very few answers. He was in a new body, and this didn’t quite feel like a dream—though it definitely felt irregular when compared to his human existence.

The way he saw was different. The speed at which he was thinking had increased. His muscles had grown considerably, and this body lacked many of the inhibitors meant to restrain their full potential. In all honesty, he had become a destructive entity this side of the world had no recorded history of, yet he worried himself on all the ways he could fail.

Christoph put his right hand over the handle of the blade at his side. He hesitated when the clawed appendage took hold. Thinking the flesh would split further or that his hand would sting from the acid burns, he winced at nothing. There was no pain. There was no limiting movement. He grabbed hold and unsheathed the blade.

Extending it before him, the blade was slightly over a meter long. It was a thick, black metal that tapered to fine edges on both sides. Those angled edges, and the triangular shape to the tip of the blade, were all a glistening silver. There didn’t seem to be much to the blade, but that was because it had not been fed.

Christoph examined the blade further. It was finely made and masterfully enchanted. He could feel the power emanating from it, but his mind couldn’t quite grasp what the affect would be.

Then the idea came to him. He hurried back around the table and flipped back toward the page of “Identify.” Rereading the notes, he found it to have several uses. One could view the characteristics of an individual, a creature, or an object.

“Identify!” Christoph used his left hand to manage the spell. That same drawing force tugged a bit of his energy through his arm before a dull energy signified the success—information filled his head.

“Gordan’s Reaping Render?” Christoph turned the blade a few times. “Every cut steals the strength of the wounded—until the time battle has ended. That’s pretty odd. A sword that gets stronger?” He considered the sword lifting boulders by itself. “At least you seem sharp. I hope I don’t have to use you.”

Christoph slid the blade back into its sheath. Memories of battle now plagued him. Smelling the blood and witnessing the carnage, it had all taken its toll on the young man. He’d cut the fields, and then cut men, and then was cut down himself. Now, he stands against a table within the body of a powerful dragonkin looking at his own claws in disbelief.

“What do I do?” He tried to find an answer. None came from the lifeless corpse still trapped within the bones of one pillar. None came from the book he’d hoped would be filled with answers instead of lessons to be learned. None came from the sword or gear about him. Not even the dream he’d tried desperately to reclaim would show him the way.

The way, his own path, was completely up to him.